A Highlander for Christmas

by Christina Skye

  As Jared finished his call, Ronan MacLeod walked in with two suitcases. “I’ll take these out to the car while you finish.”

  By the time Jared joined MacLeod outside, storm clouds were piling across the cliffs. “More snow coming?”

  “So it appears. Exactly what Perpetua Wishwell predicted. The woman is almost always right about such things.” Ronan finished stowing the last suitcase in Jared’s trunk. “There’s an old storage shed behind the Wishwells’ cottage where you can leave your car. No need to alert strangers to your presence.”

  Jared slid behind the wheel while MacLeod settled in the other seat. “Tell me something,” Jared said slowly. “Was there a gray cat sitting on the fence when we left, or was I imagining it?”

  “No cat that I noticed.” MacLeod glanced out at the swirling landscape of white. “Not much of anything to be seen now, I’m afraid.”

  There was a sharp prickling between Jared’s shoulders. There had definitely been a cat out in the snow. The impossible thing was that the cat looked exactly like the great gray creature he had seen at Draycott Abbey.

  Jared shoved the thought from his mind, concentrating on the narrow road. “Have you lived at Glenbrae long?”

  “It seems like centuries. When I met Hope, it was over for me in an instant.” His lips curved. “I expect it must have been like that with you and Maggie.”

  “There are problems.”

  “Problems always have solutions. Meanwhile, you’re among friends here. Remember that.”

  Halfway to the loch road, a brown car emerged over the hill. “Someone you know?” Jared asked softly.

  Ronan’s eyes narrowed. “No one from Glenbrae. I can count the village cars on one hand.” His voice tightened, “Could it be someone you want to avoid?”

  Jared was taking no chances. He turned the wheel sharply, pulling onto a narrow gravel road that skirted the loch. Behind them a horn blasted shrilly. The brown car roared alongside and cut across the snowy road.

  A white-haired figure in black military uniform shoved open the door, waving briskly. “Commander MacNeill, thank heaven I found you.”

  “Preston?” Jared rolled down his window and stared at his old superior officer. “What are you doing here in Scotland?”

  “Long story, MacNeill. Took me hours in this damnable weather. I’ve had some information about the box delivered to the abbey. It was an entirely new chemical explosive, and I wanted to discuss it with you privately.” His eyes flickered to MacLeod. “If that’s possible.”

  “But why—”

  Jared stiffened as a gun barrel brushed his neck.

  Preston opened the door and slid in behind him. “No more questions. You’ve put us to a great deal of trouble, you know.”

  MacLeod was already twisting in his seat when his door was flung open. He was gripped from behind by a man in a black jumpsuit. There was a short, tense struggle. Then a brutal kick to the forehead left MacLeod sprawled unconscious in the snow.

  Preston’s eyes narrowed. “Now you’ll give me the weapon in your shoulder holster.”

  Jared hesitated, then complied.

  Preston smiled thinly. “And now the backup weapon which is no doubt hidden in your boot. I worked with you in Asia, remember?”

  With Preston’s weapon jabbing his neck, Jared had no choice but to turn over his smaller pistol.

  Preston gave a curt nod. “That must be the cottage up ahead. We watched you come here this morning.”

  So they knew that, too. Grimly, Jared played out possible scenarios. “You’ll be looking for Maggie, of course.”

  “Of course,” Preston said shortly.

  “She’s not here. She went over to the village with the innkeeper to pick up some supplies.”

  “Don’t insult my intelligence, Commander. We’ve had you two in sight since the moment you left the abbey. The costumes were an amusing twist, I must admit. That should keep the bureaucrats from London off your trail for a few more days. By then, the problem will be irrelevant.” Preston wedged his pistol under Jared’s jaw. “Drive to the cottage. I have a few questions to ask the daughter of Daniel Kincade.”

  ~ ~ ~

  The front door creaked open. The wind gave a shrill cry, racing down the glen. Maggie turned from the window with a start. “Morwenna?”

  There was no answer.

  “Jared?”

  Fire crackled beside her in the silent cottage. Maggie rubbed her hands, strangely chilled at being here alone. Where were the Wishwells and the others?

  She turned and saw a shadow cross the doorway. Fear turned to surprise. “Anders?”

  He looked far more tired than the last time she had seen him in London. His beard was bushy and untended, and there were dark circles under his heavy glasses. “Why are you here?”

  He moved forward uncertainly. “For many reasons.”

  “I don’t understand. How did you find me?”

  Suddenly fear left Maggie frozen. Was Anders one of her father’s enemies? Had he betrayed his oldest friend, then followed her here for some dark intent?

  Regret played across his gaunt face. “I know you don’t understand,” he said. “That is also my fault.”

  “Did you betray him?”

  “I suppose in a way I did. Daniel Kincade died so that I could live.” His voice changed as he spoke. The heavy accent vanished, leaving only the lengthened vowels of a Boston boyhood. Each word clawed at Maggie’s memory.

  Recognition came to her in a cruel rush. Maggie struggled to her feet. “No,” she whispered. “You’re Anders. You have to be.”

  “Perhaps I’ve played my role so long that I forget who I am, my love.”

  “You’re not my father,” she rasped. “I don’t believe it.”

  But she saw the small signs of familiarity now. How could she not have noticed them before?

  Because she’d thought him dead.

  On their evening in London, she’d seen exactly what she’d expected to see: an old man changed by age and stress.

  She stared at him blindly.

  Her father.

  Not dead at all.

  Hidden in plain sight.

  Her breath caught a she struggled with an urge to run to him, and then to shout and accuse in anger. “You let me believe you were dead.” She choked out the words, while all the old wounds left her bleeding inside.

  “You left me to fight their accusations and cry over your grave. Month after month they hounded us. They called you a thief and a coward. But I always believed in you.”

  Daniel Kincaid rubbed his tired eyes. “It was the only way, Maggie.” Slowly, gently, he knelt before her and took her hands. “Anders knew that he had a heart condition which left him only a little time to live. I’d spoken to him of my danger, and he made the offer to let me assume his identity. He’d planned a .visit to a clinic in Singapore, but as he’d suspected, he didn’t survive the month. Then I took his place, just as we’d planned, after arranging my death in that flight over Sumatra.”

  “But there were other bodies found in the wreckage. What happened to them? You didn’t—”

  “Kill them?” He shook his head grimly. “There are ways, my love.” Her father touched her face gently. “That bit of jungle isn’t the easiest area to search, and the local teams had almost no equipment. Thanks to incessant rains and two mudslides, the physical evidence was nearly useless. I’d planned it that way, of course.”

  Something warm dropped onto Maggie’s hand. She realized it was a tear. Whether hers or her father’s she could not say.

  He was alive. He was here.

  And he hadn’t trusted her with the truth.

  Her throat tightened, burning painfully. “But why? Was it all some game?”

  “I’m sorry, Maggie. God help me, I wish I could have done things differently. But these men have no morals. An enemy to one of them is an enemy to all of them. They are very powerful and my death was the only way to keep you safe.”

  She pu
lled away from him, struggling to understand. He must have planned his disappearance for months. “What do they want from you?”

  “What men have always wanted. Power, information. Control over other men.” He caught her hands, frowning at the red welt along her palm. “This is new?”

  She nodded, too confused by emotion to speak.

  “You’ve got to be more careful. I’ve always warned you to be careful, but you never listened.”

  Nothing had changed, Maggie thought. Her father was still the genius, still teaching, badgering, and controlling her.

  Except now he’d put her life and a dozen others into danger At that moment Maggie saw Daniel Kincade exactly as he was—a passionate man with great weaknesses.

  His eyes narrowed. “What’s wrong?”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “You have the ring I gave you in London?”

  Maggie nodded slowly.

  “You studied the facets, I take it?”

  She frowned. “They were badly formed. I couldn’t understand why Anders—or you—would have called it beautiful. For some reason there was an extra row of facets just above the crown.”

  He looked pleased at her answer. “And another row at the base. Too small for beauty, but for my purpose they were perfect. It’s all about light, Maggie.” His hands closed urgently. “If a focused beam is sent through those rows of facets at the proper angle, the light is distorted.”

  “Distorted how?”

  “A complete shift. With proper tools that light can disrupt all nearby electromagnetic fields. Do you understand what that means?”

  “No radios. No televisions,” she slowly.

  “That and a thousand other things. It changes our world and all of our communications. With that new microwave technology, everything changes, Maggie. Do you understand? It strengthens us—and it cripples our enemies. But I’d only been able to produce a limited area of distortion. I needed a different facet arrangement to broaden the angle and enhance the effect. I’ve been working on the arrangement for a long time.” When she didn’t answer, he frowned at her. “Don’t you understand what this could mean, Maggie? It would be the ultimate power. Can’t you realize the advantage it would give an attacking army in war?”

  Maggie’s whole body felt stiff and cold. She pushed away from him, locking her arms over her waist. “Who are you?” she whispered. “All you talk about is war and power and control. I don’t know you. I see now that I never did.”

  His face hardened. “My design work was real enough. I loved the jewels and their history. But I always wanted to see more, to understand everything. That’s how I was recruited twenty-five years ago, because I was smart and tough and curious. I used all my friendships and my contacts, and I won’t apologize for it,” he said coldly. “I believe in everything I did and the country I did it for.”

  “And just what country was that?” Maggie whispered.

  “You can ask me such a question?” His body stiffened sharply. “You think I would betray my own government?”

  “I don’t know anything about you. How could I when you never told me the truth?”

  “I couldn’t,” he said urgently. “All my research was kept secret, closely monitored by a military team. But three years ago things began to change. The reports I wrote were taken away unread, and the chain of command changed. I was ordered to report to one man. I learned that he was part of a group—determined to control my discoveries. I played along at first, hoping for a look at their complete network. It is staggering, Maggie. They have believers in a dozen continents and a dozen armies, and their loyalty borders on madness.” He made an impatient sound, achingly like the sound she had heard him make on a dozen occasions when he was inspecting a flawed stone or a carelessly formed setting.

  That single sound told Maggie more than hours of explanations. This was the father she remembered, a man always quick to criticize a competitor’s work. The same father who had never had time for his lonely daughter.

  “I couldn’t take the chance of telling you, Maggie. The less you knew, the safer you would be. I believed that then and I believe it now.”

  She tried to harden her heart. She tried to hate him for the cold-blooded decisions he had made. “Then why are you here?”

  “Because I need the ring. I knew they were watching me in London, and I couldn’t chance it falling into the wrong hands. And when you appeared, I gave it to you. I knew the Scotsman would keep you safe. Otherwise, I’d never have taken such a risk. In case they found me, I wanted to be certain you would have the stones, Maggie. Perhaps someday you would unlock the full value of all I’d discovered.” He pulled off his glasses and bent forward urgently. “It’s in the stones, little peach. The power is in the cut. The right facets and gem material can do things beyond imagining.”

  The stones.

  Of course, that was the reason. If not for them she might never have known he was still alive. But Maggie couldn’t care about stones and their powers. She could only care about the man. “How did you change your face?” she whispered, seeing all that was familiar blurred over all that was different.

  “Surgery. Exercises. Cosmetic implants. It’s not as difficult as you might imagine. I had access to a world which specializes in such things, remember? The trick was in seeing that my real identity was never revealed to those who did the surgical corrections. Then I had to make the exchange exactly at the moment Anders died. Everyone was astounded at his miraculous recovery, I can assure you. I had to substitute my own medical records, of course. The timing was everything. Now enough about the past,” he said grimly. “I have very little time before they trace me here. I have five names of those in London who are active at high levels, but I’m going to need the ring when I take my evidence to the authorities. It will be crucial to making my case believable.”

  Gently Maggie pulled a silken string from beneath her sweater. On the end hung the ring that her father, as Anders, had given her that rainy night in London. “Take it. It’s yours anyway.”

  His hands closed over hers almost angrily. “No, I told you the truth. It was meant to be yours. Everything I had was meant to be yours. It broke my heart when you sold my last stones, but you were wonderful. From what I’ve heard, you did a splendid job.”

  “Don’t,” she said brokenly, not wanting to remember. She knew nothing of the shadow world he inhabited, and she wanted to remember her father as he had been, flawed but passionate. Honest and generous. Not this cold-eyed stranger with impossible tales of conspiracy and revenge.

  “I love you, Maggie, and I loved your mother. My profession had nothing to do with that. But each year the jobs grew longer, the game more complex.”

  “A game? Is that what it was to you?” She stared at him, cold and furious. “All those months you were gone and all the days that we missed you were simply a game?”

  He shook his head. “I considered it an honor to complete the work I was given. I won’t see everything I’ve discovered fall into the hands of zealots.”

  “You came back too late. I’ve gotten over you, Daddy. I don’t think I want you back, not like this.” The words burned in her throat. “I can’t afford the damage you always seem to cause.”

  “You can’t mean that.”

  Snow swirled at the window as they stared at one another. In the sudden, trembling silence, Maggie heard a soft cough, followed by a knock at the door.

  “Morwenna, is that you?”

  The door opened, letting in a sprinkling of snow. “Oh, I beg your pardon. I wasn’t sure that anyone was here.” A small woman in a bright yellow ski parka stood on the steps, her shoulders covered with snow. “We’re lost. We were looking for Glenbrae House, but we must have taken the wrong road. You see, we’ve just driven up from Manchester and we couldn’t see anything in the snow.”

  Maggie forced her voice to be level and calm. “If you want Glenbrae House, you need to take the next road down the hill.”

  Abruptly something
moved out in the snow. A gray form shot past the woman’s feet, and she cried out, stumbling against the doorway.

  Daniel Kincade rose slowly. “Are you all right?”

  “I think so. Whatever it was is gone now.” Snow drifted down over the loch as the woman sat up shakily. Her hand brushed at her temple. “It’s my head.”

  “Let me help you.” Daniel Kincade helped her to a chair. “You haven’t hurt yourself, I hope.”

  Her hands closed on his arm, and a dreamy, expectant look filled her smooth features. “No, I’m fine now,” she said. “Lovely, in fact.” Her fingers splayed open, working gently across his arm. “I’ll just rest here another moment if I may. I’d like to catch my breath, if that’s all right with you.”

  “Of course,” Maggie said.

  But her father pulled his hand from beneath the woman’s fingers. “You say you drove up from Manchester? There was bad weather all along that route. I heard that the roads were closed,” he said slowly.

  Then he took a step back.

  “Did you indeed?” The woman’s green eyes narrowed. “A slip on my part. I should have said we came in by boat. I wasn’t expecting you to notice. I was certain that your reunion with your daughter would distract you.”

  His hand dove to his pocket, but her own was faster. Sunlight played over a small pistol as she circled the room carefully. “And now that we’ve established your identity at last, we’ll wait for the others. They have a great many questions to ask you, Mr. Kincade. While we wait, you’ll kindly step away from your daughter.”

  “No.” Kincade moved with surprising speed for a man of his age, blocking Maggie with his body.

  The woman frowned. “It’s quite pointless, I assure you. Neither of you will be going anywhere.”

  “No, you’ve made the mistake,” Kincade said grimly. “You don’t dare to shoot me. Without what I have in my head, you and your ugly group are powerless.”

  “Wrong again. Everything you know is now mine. All the details of the facet angles. All the important contacts in your government, and the names of our group whom you’ve discovered.” She smiled slowly. “I have a most unusual gift, you see. Through physical contact, I can register thoughts and emotions. With practice I’ve become quite good, I assure you.”